


we all fall down

by sinaddict



Category: Veronica Mars (TV)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-07-22
Updated: 2005-07-22
Packaged: 2017-10-08 22:26:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/80123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinaddict/pseuds/sinaddict
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It wasn't supposed to end like this, and now you don't know what to do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we all fall down

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers through 'Leave it to Beaver'.

I.

It wasn't supposed to end like this, you understand. Things were supposed to be like the movies, where everything got wrapped up nice and neat. No loose ends. The bad guy's dead and the good guys sail off into the sunset to live happily ever after. (Whatever that means.)

Solving the mystery was supposed to make everything better.

It wasn't supposed to end like this, and now you don't know what to do.

 

II.

  
You can sum up Pope in seven words: "Life's a bitch. And then you die."

You think it kind of sucks that those same seven words sum up your life, too.

Funny how you thought solving Lilly's murder would suddenly make everything all better again. Not like it used to be, you tell yourself, because you don't need things to be completely like they used to be, do you? You don't want to hang out with the 09'ers and spend all day at the beach avoiding your chem homework.

(Okay, so you wouldn't be averse to a little 09'er groveling, but still...)

You thought things would be _different_.

Turns out things just got _worse_.

 

III.

You can't find the words to apologize to Logan. You know that you should even if you were only acting on the evidence you had. (You doubt Logan sees anything reasonable about _that_.) You should call him and just get it over with, say something like, "I should have known you would never hurt Lilly -- I did know that, deep down somewhere -- I just got confused..."

Problem is, you'd be lying.

Somewhere in your head, there's a niggling little doubt. Too many articles you've read about inherited genetics and the children of abusers, you think. If Aaron Echolls can beat his son and lock you in a trunk and listen to you scream while he sets it on fire, who's to say that Logan didn't pick up some of those violent tendencies?

"That's bullshit," Duncan tells you vehemently, more passionate about this than you've seen him about anything since long before Lilly died. "Logan would never, he'd _never_\--"

"I know," you cut him off, pretending you do know that. "Logan would never hurt anyone."

Funny thing is, once upon a time you've thought the same thing about everyone else, too.

And look where _that's_ gotten you.

 

IV.

You think Lilly would be jealous of what you know she'd call your "boy harem".

Even though he knows you aren't his sister, Duncan checks up on you at least every other day, still caught somewhere between looking out for you and making sure nobody else is looking _at_ you, at least not the way that he does. You haven't talked to Logan since that day at the beach, but Duncan runs interference for you, making sure Logan's _okay_.

(Whatever that means.)

Weevil's teaching you how to drive a motorcycle and cook his grandmother's enchiladas since you told him that God couldn't successfully teach you to cook and he took it as a challenge. Leo stops by the office now and then under the pretense of asking for help with tracking down something. And you suspect that your Dad has Cliff McCormack checking in on you whenever he has to go out of town since let's face it, Cliffy should know by now where to track down his regulars without resorting to hiring a seventeen-year-old to do it for him.

You think Lilly would be jealous, and that makes you ache a little inside.

 

V.

The notes were buried under a stack of magazines and old newspapers in the recycling. You wouldn't have ever even known they existed if you hadn't accidentally thrown out that page of coupons for Zeke's Pizza and nearly blew up the stove trying to make your own before you gave up and decided to call out.

You find the notes, and just like when you saw Lilly's body, your world shifts just enough to throw you to the ground like it doesn't want you to ever get up again.

You guess your father was trying to protect you, that's why he didn't tell you. Or maybe he just didn't want to be the one responsible for giving you the final straw that would make you _hate_ your mother.

It wasn't enough she wasted the college money you worked for, she had to take the money your father earned, too.

You know your dad won't do anything about it, but you? You will.

 

VI.

"I need to report a crime."

And this time _Deputy_ Lamb rolls his eyes and gestures toward the seat across from his desk with an annoyed sigh. "What now, Veronica?" he asks, somehow managing to make your name sound like a dirty word. "If the trailer next to yours is too loud again..."

"We'd be sure to let you know if you were making too much noise," you smirk at him, and score -- round one goes to you and he knows it. "A fifty-thousand dollar cashier's check was stolen from my dad."

"Oh, really?" Lamb leans forward, twirling a pen between his fingers. "And why isn't your _Dad_ the one reporting it."

"Because my mother is the one who stole it."

There's a hint of surprise on Lamb's face before his eyes narrow, and you can tell just by looking at him that he's working the angles. You idly wonder if he's this obvious when he's interrogating suspects. "So you, what? Want the money back so you can be one big happy family again?"

"The money's already gone." You knew the instant you saw your father's notes that you'd never lay eyes on any of that money. "I want you to find her and arrest her."

Lamb's expression is giving something away that you can't quite interpret, but since it's not his usual disdain or glee at your misfortune, you add with faux innocence, "You _do_ still do that, right? Arrest criminals?"

 

VII.

You don't see Lamb for almost a month when he suddenly saunters into the office and drops himself into the chair across from your desk, cracking his gum and putting his feet up just to be obnoxious. "You do know the Seventh Veil is one street over, right?"

"And yet here _you_ are," he smirks at you. "Thought you might want to know your mom was picked up in Oklahoma last week for passing bad checks."

It shouldn't, no wait, it _doesn't_ surprise you that she actually did manage to run through fifty grand in a month and half. But you still feel your expression giving too much away because now it's all real -- you're not going to college. You're not going to get out of Neptune and become something. You're going to be here answering phones and tailing cheating spouses for the rest of your life, and oh god, you are _not_ going to cry about this.

Lamb drops his feet to the ground, suddenly looking somber as he leans forward in that classic 'cop' pose, and you shake it off because he is the last person in the world you're ever going to let see you cry again. You're proud of how calm and stable your voice is as you ask about the particulars of an extradition and whether you or your dad will have to testify if she won't admit to what she did, and--

"Veronica," Lamb cuts you off, and he has never once looked at you like that before, said your name like it wasn't a curse or you weren't an annoyance. And you know before he even says anything that something is horribly, horribly wrong here.

He says quietly, calmly, "She's dead."

And you excuse yourself to go throw up in the bathroom.

 

VIII.

When you come back out of the bathroom, you find Lamb leafing through the files on your desk. That you can't come up with the energy to snark at him about it tells you something. He doesn't bother looking up from the file he's reading as he tells you, "Your father's on his way. Should only be another five minutes."

"How?" The word is out of your mouth before you think, and you can't decide whether you really want to know or not.

He snaps the folder closed and drops it on the desk, folding his arms over his chest as he turns to look at you. "Keith can tell you."

'If he wants you to know,' may as well have been tacked on to the end of the sentence, and you glare at Lamb. "How?" you ask more forcefully, certain now that you do want to know.

"Jesus, you would get his stubbornness," he gives an irritated sigh as he takes your arm and forcibly sits you down on the couch. There's something a little wrong with that sentence, and you turn it over in your head a few times before you realize that it's the familiarity he said it with that's bothering you.

"Do I need to use smaller words?" he raises an eyebrow with that smirk that makes you wish you could punch him without getting arrested for assaulting a police officer. "Your. Dad. Can. Tell. You."

You spend the six and a half minutes it takes your dad to get there glaring at Lamb and wondering if you could talk Weevil into taping him naked to the school flagpole.

 

IX.

Your dad refuses to tell you how your mother died.

He's also somehow managed to swear the whole of Neptune to secrecy on the matter (a trick you'd like to learn) since you can't get Leo to access the file for you or convince Cliff to look into it for you, and all of your usual sources aren't saying a single word.

Which is how you came to be standing outside Lamb's office door.

You really hadn't set out to eavesdrop. If it had been some kind of police matter, you would've interrupted, you're sure. But it's not a police matter, it's your dad in the office arguing with Lamb. "Damn it, Don, you had no right to tell her about Lianne."

"Hey, she's the one who came in asking me to track down your wife and arrest her," a chair squeaks as Lamb undoubtedly does his patented 'lean back and smirk'. "You should be proud, Keith. Not many kids would come turn in one of their parents like that. She's almost as cold as you are."

The crashing sound makes you jump, and there's a low murmur of voices that you can't distinguish for a few moments before you hear the tone of your father's voice and strain to make out the words. All you can hear is, "used to be," before you hear movement and have to hide around the corner.

You don't wait long after watching your father leave before you enter Lamb's office without knocking and ask, "How did my mother die?"

Lamb just looks at you for a long moment before nodding toward the chair. "Sit down."

 

X.

It wasn't supposed to end like this, you understand. Things were supposed to be like the movies, where the good guys sail off into the sunset to live happily ever after.

(Whatever that means.)

It wasn't supposed to end like this, and you still don't know what to do.


End file.
